Garden of Love
Duration: 7:16
Composed for oboist Bart Schneemann in March 2002 with support from the Dutch FPA , Garden of Love is based on a poem by William Blake. The audio track consists of sound bytes from speech, oboes, harpsichord, birds and electronic sounds. Garden of Love can be performed on soprano sax, Bb clarinet, flute, recorder,violin, xylophone or guitar. Visual artist Amber Boardman created a concert video that can be used for live performances and installations.
Garden of Love was recorded on CD by oboists Bart Schneemann and Irma Kort and by saxophonists Arno Bornkamp, Tim McAllister, Michael Nicollella and Emmanuel Graglia, who added a guitar part.
The soprano sax version, featuring Masanori Oishi was recorded for Japanese National TV. That video is not available.
THE GARDEN OF LOVE
I went to the Garden of Love.
and saw what I never had seen:
A chapel was built in the midst,
where I used to play on the green.
And the gates of this chapel were shut,
and ‘Thou shalt not’ writ over the door;
So I turn’d to the Garden of Love,
that so many sweet flowers bore.
And I saw it was filled with graves,
and tomb-stones where flowers should be:
And priests in black gowns, were walking their rounds,
and binding with briars, my joys and desires.
William Blake
Oboist Irma Kort, from the album JacobTV – Shining City:
Concert Video by Amber Boardman: